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Abraljam 5It«roln 

Att Apprpnattnn 



BENJAMIN RUSH COWEN 

BREVET BRIGADIER GENERAL 

Paymaster U. S. Army 1861-4; 
Adjutant General of Ohio 
1864-8; Assistant Secre- 
tary of the Interior 
1871-6. 



C 



CINCINNATI 

THE ROBERT CLARKE CO. 
1909 



Copyright, 1909 
By benjamin SPRAGUE COWEN 



LIBRARY ot CONGRESS 
Two Copies Received 

FEB 23 lyoy 

CLASS a^ XXc Mo, 
COPY J. 






Preface 



rjENJAMIN RUSH CO WEN was born at 
■*^ Moorfield, Ohio, August 15, 1831, and died 
at Cincinnati, January 29, 1908. During his long 
life he served his country as a legislative officer, 
as Adjutant-General of Ohio during the trying Civil 
War period, as Assistant Secretary of the Interior under 
President Grant and as Clerk of the Federal Courts 
for Southern Ohio; at intervals engaging in general 
business, in banking and in editorial and literary 
labors. 

With a classical education and practical training, 
and a natural aptitude as a v^riter he ranked with the 
strongest editors of his time, and the clearness of dic- 
tion and underlying sound sense in what he wrote 
gave particular value to his various papers on the 



historical characters and incidents with which he had 
been connected. He refused to allow these papers 
to be printed until after his death, giving them to one 
of his sons some months before that sad event with the 
brief remark: 

"After I am gone I want you to make such disposition 
of these as you see fit." 

In accordance with that injunction, the Address on 
Lincoln is now given publicity, the Centenary of the 
First American making it inadvisable to hold it until 
arrangements can be perfected for the publication 
of his other manuscripts. 

B. S. COWEN. 

Cincinnati, January 29, 1909. 



Abraham Lincoln 

An instructed Democracy in which there is absolute 
freedom of initiative, of privilege and of opportunity 
is never at a loss for heroes of its own to applaud 
and emulate and honor. The history of this Nation 
is luminous with the names of those who, in war and 
peace, in public and in private life, in field, in forum 
and in factory, have borne its banners to victory in 
every step of its wonderful progress. 

Most prominent of the long hne of those whom 
we dehght to honor, and one who stands out as a 
great personal and historical promontory, marking 
the most important era in that progress, is that homely 
sage and hejo of the backwoods, who, crownless 
and unheralded, came from his retirement and in a 
few direct but pregnant sentences; a silence that 
was golden and a speech that was silvern; by masterly 

[5] 



action and masterly inaction, won the confidence of 
the people as he moved unscathed through the thrice 
heated furnace of- Civil War. 

It is a trite saying that "circumstances make the 
man", but if they made Abraham Lincoln, it was 
circumstances that influenced hrm before he was 
known to. the world. It was th« privation and the 
self-denial of his fifty formative years which molded 
and fixed his character so firmly and so well, that he 
was able, in the fulness of time, to impress that character 
on his surroundings in the last four years of his life 
to a greater extent than any of his predeciessors had 
done, or than any of us were able to realize until 
his work was completed. 

With none of the factitious advantages which his 
predecessors had enjoyed, but with every conceivable 
drawback and embarrassment, as the world judges 
such things, Lincoln seemed to vault, as it were, at 
a singk bound into the front rank of statesmen arid 
rulers. For such an hour he- proved the man of des- 
tiny. 

Men marvelled at this and resented it, for a time, 

[6] 



as a violation of all the traditions. They wondered 
whence he had hi& wisdorn, his rare poise of character, 
his accurate judgment, his consummate leadership, 
his mastery of. words, and it is only since his death, 
that the- story of his training and development has 
revealed the secret. His whole life, as we now know 
it, seemed a preparation for the great emergency 
of -liberty, and afforded that training of adversity 
which tempers men for any hazard. 

Reared amid surroundings so humble and obscure 
that they would seem sufficient to crush out all manly 
ambition, or possibility of advancement; until long 
after his majority subject to the most grinding poverty; 
in a community where wealth and creature comforts 
as we know them were unknown — the poorest; 
awkward, uncouth, and ungainly in person to the ex- 
tent of inviting ridicule even after he became President; 
without any of the arts and blandishments deemed 
essential to popular acclaim or political preferment; 
uneducated so far as schools educate; without intel- 
lectual ancestry or pride of birth, he burst upon the coun- 
try at the most critical period in our history, mature in 

[7] 



years, ripe in judgment and of such rare mental en- 
dowment and such inherent and genuine manhood as 
drew the most distinguished and cultured men of the 
the country to his support. 

What was the secret of his development ? 

More than any other man, Mr. Lincoln illustrated 
the operation of those peculiar forces which gave 
to the West such masterful influence in public affairs. 
He was of the West western; he lived his life on the 
frontier; its growth was his growth; its life his life, 
and yet when he came from his obscurity and entered 
into the great national arena he understood the older 
East far better than the East understood him or his 
people. In fact he seemed at times to understand 
the East better than the East understood itself. 

The West of Mr. Lincoln's lifetime was intensely 
political and it felt, in a pecuHar sense, the pulse 
of the Nation's life throbbing in the great artery of 
emigration that stretched athwart the continent. In 
no sense was it separate from the East, because it 
was constantly receiving fresh members from thence 
and with all such accessions came the fresh influence 

[8] 



of suggestion and the impulse of assimilation. These 
forces he utilized to the full, so that few men of any 
time excelled him in the capacity of understanding 
whatever he had in hand, and to study that quality 
in him is to study the forces which shaped the national 
life of that period. 

While it is true that he never laid aside the appearance 
of the rough and brawny frontiersman, yet he never 
ceased to grow in all the qualities that enter into the 
strength and dignity of real greatness. With the 
shrewd and seeing eye of the woodsman, than which 
none is shrewder or more observant, his view readily 
adjusted itself to see and give due weight to greater 
things, under whatever aspect they were presented. 

He constantly mixed with all sorts and conditions 
of men from every section of the country and the 
world, discussing the policies of the State and the 
Nation, so that his mind became traveled, enlightened, 
and trained, in spite of the apparent narrowness and 
sordidness of his environment. 

His debate with Douglas in 1858 first brought 
him to the attention of the people outside of his State, 

[9] 



as much, perhaps, at the first, because of the prestige 
of his opponent as from the character of his speeches. 
The country accepted his talent on sight, largely 
because of his ability to hold his own in debate with 
the recognized leader of the United States Senate. 

Cincinnati has an interesting, though somewhat 
remote connection with the Lincoln-Douglas debate, 
though I mention it more to illustrate Mr. Lincoln's 
remarkable magnanimity even before he came upon 
the wider arena where he won immortality. 

In 1857 he was associated with Mr. Edwin M. 
Stanton, then a citizen of Pittsburg, and Mr. George 
Harding, a citizen of Philadelphia, in a celebrated 
patent cause involving the validity of the McCormick 
reaper patents. Both Stanton and Harding were 
recognized as great leaders in the practice of patent 
law. The cause was one involving millions of dollars, 
and came on for argument in the United States Circuit 
Court in this city, with Lincoln, Stanton and Harding 
present as counsel for McCormick. 

Mr. Lincoln had prepared an elaborate brief and all 
the attorneys came prepared for a battle royal by 

[10] 



reason of the large interests at stake. Neither Stanton 
nor Harding had ever seen Lincoln until they met on 
that occasion, and had probably never heard of him 
as a practitioner of patent law. His appearance was 
not such as to recommend him to a fastidious eastern 
lawyer, who was always especially careful of his 
personal appearance. He wore a long, loose and some- 
what soiled linen duster and his appearance and man- 
ners were uninviting. Both of his colleagues snubbed 
him, refused to consult with him or to associate with 
him while here, and openly derided and insulted him. 
When the cause was called for argument Mr. Lincoln 
was at his post, notwithstanding the treatment of his 
colleagues, who still persistently refused to recognize 
him as of counsel. The several machines w^ere on exhi- 
bition, as is usual in such cases, when Mr. Lincoln took 
hold of the tongue of one of them and began pushing 
it back and forth to exhibit its action, saying as 
he did so, "I guess I can do this part of the work as 
w^ell as any of you." Thereupon Stanton took hold 
of Lincoln's coat tails and rudely jerked him aside, 
telling him to get out of the way. 

[II] 



This so mortified Mr. Lincoln that he retired from 
the court room, sent his brief to Stanton and left for 
home without taking part in the argument. Stanton 
returned the brief unopened. 

After the trial was over Mr. McCormick sent Lin- 
coln a check for ^3000, which the latter returned, say- 
ing he had earned nothing in the case. McCormick 
sent the check again, saying that he was the best 
judge of the value of Lincoln's services. Lincoln 
then retained the fee and it was with that money he 
was able to meet the expenses of his debate with 
Douglas. 

Notwithstanding the humiliation and insult Mr. 
Lincoln could recognize talent under any circum- 
stances, and, when he became President, four years 
later, he offered Mr. Harding the Commissionership 
of Patents, which was declined, and he appointed Mr. 
Stanton Secretary of War, an example of magnanim- 
ity without a parallel in the history of our politics. 

In telling me the incident a year or two since, Mr. 
Harding said that when Lincoln sent for him to come 
to Washington in March, 1861, before calling at the 

[12] 



White House he called on Stanton, at his residence in 
Washington, This was some months before the latter 
became Secretary of War. He found Stanton on the 
croquet ground and as he approached him, Stanton's 
greeting was: *'By the way, Harding, I have found 
out that there is a great deal more in that man Lincoln 
than we thought when we met him in Cincinnati." 
His visit to New York soon after the Lincoln- 
Douglas debate, which grew^ out of the reputation 
acquired therein, and his speech in Cooper Insti- 
tute in February, i860, may be regarded as his first 
appearance in the National political arena. That 
speech was a revelation to the people of the East, who 
had been accustomed to look upon the great West of 
that day much as the Jews of old looked upon GaHlee 
— whence no good thing could come. He stormed the 
citadel of their pride of culture, struck the keynote 
of the campaign of i860, and at the conclusion of 
that speech found himself an important factor in an 
important era in national affairs. That speech was 
the most accurate and impartial epitome of the his- 
tory of the slave power in this country that had ever 

[13I 



appeared, setting it forth with such clearness, coher- 
ence and power that it became the reliable and irref- 
utable textbook for future campaigns. 

The closing words of his first inaugural address, 
to which nothing in our literature of plaintive en- 
treaty is comparable, may be taken as a sample of his 
literary style at the opening of his official career: 

"Though passion may have strained it must not 
break our bonds of affection. The mystic chords 
of memory stretching from every patriot grave to every 
loving heart and hearthstone all over this broad land 
will yet swell the chorus of the Union when again 
touched, as they surely will be by the better angels 
of our nature." 

His Gettysburg oration, really an impromptu ef- 
fort, and a later production, was the envy of Edward 
Everett who was a recognized master of verbal expres- 
sion and saw in Mr. Lincoln's speech a nation's classic. 

The Westminster Review said that utterance of 
Lincoln excelled the oration of Pericles over the dead 
of the first year of the Peloponnesian War by as much 
as Nature takes precedence of Art. 

[14] 



It has been suggested that Mr. Lincoln might, with 
great propriety, be called as a witness for Shakespeare 
against those criticasters who deny him the author- 
ship of the plays which bear his name, for the sole rea- 
son that they cannot imagine it possible to produce 
such results unaided by books and schools and colleges. 
If these men could show similar results through such 
helps they may then have one fact tending to prove 
that such results cannot be reached without such 
helps. But in the absence of proof I must accept 
both Lincoln and Shakespeare and confess ignor- 
ance of the methods by which they became so great. 

That oration shows with striking force the power 
of the monosyllable in composition when deftly handled. 
Out of a total of two hundred and ninety-eight words 
in the oration, one hundred and ninety-five are words 
of one syllable. 

Not alone in his messages and formal State papers 
do those beautiful and forcible examples of rhetoric 
appear, but in his private letters as well. Here, for ex- 
ample, is an extract from one of his letters, evidently 



[15] 



written in haste, but which must Hve while the memory 
of our Civil War endures: 

"When peace with victory comes there will be some 
black men who will remember that with silent tongue 
and clenched teeth and steady eye and well poised 
bayonet they have helped on mankind to this great con- 
summation. While I fear there will be some white men 
unable to forget that with malignant heart and deceit- 
ful speech they have striven to hinder and prevent it." 

There are many quotable phrases in his writings. 
I noticed at an anti-expansion meeting at the Odeon 
a while ago, this sentiment from Mr. Lincoln was made 
to do duty as a motto for the occasion: "No man is 
good enough to govern another without that other's 
consent." That sounds very fine as an abstract prop- 
osition, yet the little Americans who figured at that 
meeting forgot that Mr. Lincoln's title to fame rests 
chiefly on the fact that he compelled the people of 
sixteen states to submit to a government they had re- 
pudiated and foresworn. 

With none of the bold, impassionate eloquence of 
Phillips, or the ripe thought of Evarts, or the ornate 

[i6] 



rhetoric of Ingersoll, Lincoln was the superior of them 
all in clear, logical statement of issues and of the prin- 
ciples by which those issues were defended and main- 
tained. Another great secret of his power was the pos- 
session of that deep, great, genuine sincerity which Car- 
lyle said was the first characteristic of all men in any 
way heroic. 

Careful study of his speeches reveals an unusual 
charm of statement, an unanswerable style of reason- 
ing, forcible illustrations in which romance and logic, 
fun and pathos were singularly combined. 

I first heard the name of Abraham Lincoln used in 
a public meeting at the Philadelphia National Repub- 
lican Convention in 1856, which was two years before 
his debate with Douglas. An enthusiastic Illinois dele- 
gate incidentally referred to him in that convention as 
a possible candidate for President in i860. But the 
name had no conjuring power and fell upon unheeding 
ears, which heard it for the first time. Yet we now 
know that Mr. Lincoln was even then a well known and 
acknowledged leader of his party in his own state. But 
IlUnois, fifty years ago, was far less familiar to Eastern 

[17] 



people and even to those of Ohio, than the new and dis- 
tant state of Washington is to-day. 

The speaker, observing with evident surprise that the 
name of Lincoln elicited no response from the Conven- 
tion, said in prophetic words: 

"You do not seem to know who Abraham Lincoln is, 
but we in Illinois know him, and the day is coming 
when you and the whole country will know him." 

Later in the Convention, however, Mr. Lincoln re- 
ceived one hundred and ten votes for Vice-President. 
Fortunately, perhaps, he was not nominated. 

With characteristic zeal and courage Mr. Lincoln 
early championed the cause of freedom, and careless 
of the obloquy which that position invoked in the com- 
munity and the state in which he lived, he put all thought 
of immediate promotion behind him and boldly chal- 
lenged the right of the slaveholder to invade the terri- 
tories with his pecuUar institution, saying that he 
would rather fail on that platform than succeed on 
any other. He was a splendid example of a politician 
of absolute intellectual honesty, indulging in no am- 
biguous terms, making no mental reservations, but 

[i8] 



daring to think freely and to speak and act openly. 
In his campaigns he scattered pearls of prophecy 
before the swinish herd which would have turned and 
rent him had he been less able and determined. He 
told them that this nation could not exist half slave 
and half free, but, Cassandra like, his prophecies were 
always discredited and ridiculed until they became his- 
tory, when his wisdom was acknowledged. 

He battled manfully for the election of Fremont 
in 1856, but not with hope of success, for no man knew 
better than he the resources of the opposition and the 
tremendous power of a hostile public sentiment. But 
he fought for the future, confident that the new party 
must win sooner or later because its cause was just, 
and he became the recognized leader of his party in 
Illinois on its organization and was its idol while he 
lived. 

The events following the election of Mr. Buchanan; 
his pitiful, criminal weakness; the growing arrogance 
of the slave power; the overt and monstrous treason of 
Buchanan's cabinet officers; the rapid increase of the 
new party; the growing unrest of the South; the threats 

[19I 



of secession; the exceptional bitterness of the campaign 
of i860; the nomination and election of Mr. Lincoln; 
the secession of seven states before his inauguration 
and before he had an opportunity officially to define 
his attitude toward the South are matters of famihar 
history with which it is not my purpose to deal, and I 
come to mention the first time I saw Mr. Lincoln. 

It was in February, 1861, while he was on his way 
to Washington to his inauguration. I was chief clerk 
of the Ohio House of Representatives, and Mr. Lincoln 
was received by both houses of the General Assembly 
in joint session in the hall of the house. The Legis- 
lature of that year was a memorable body, not only 
because of the important questions it had to deal with, 
and did deal with wisely and promptly, but because it 
contained many men who had a large part in making 
the history of the next two decades. (Among its mem- 
bers were one who became President, one who became 
Governor, one who became a Justice of the United 
States Supreme Court, two who became cabinet officers, 
eighteen who during the war became general officers, 
or colonels, and a number of officers of lesser grade, 

[20] 



one who was elected United States Senator, and fourteen 
who became members of Congress.) 

Mr. Lincoln came directly from the train to the hall 
of the house, passed up the center aisle and stood fac- 
ing the Speaker's desk, within three feet of where I 
stood, while the presiding officer made the address of 
welcome. He was so tall that, standing on the floor, 
as he did, his eyes seemed on a level with mine as I 
stood on the raised platform of the clerk's desk. 

He was a singular looking personage. His appear- 
ance at first glance was decidedly unprepossessing. 
Personal peculiarities are generally forgotten on a more 
intimate acquaintance, provided that acquaintance be 
favorable, but at first sight they largely control our es- 
timate of men. Mr. Lincoln was being judged by out- 
ward appearance only, which is often a very poor stand- 
ard. It certainly was in this case to an unusual degree. 

Tall, brawny and angular in frame, with prominent, 
rugged and unintellectual features, gaunt cheeks ren- 
dered more marked by his evident fatigue of travel, 
in a suit of ill fitting clothes, he looked anything but a 
statesman or a President. His response to the address 

[21] 



of welcome was commonplace and was a disappoint- 
ment to his friends, a subject of ridicule to his oppo- 
nents. His voice was quaint and high pitched, though 
not unpleasant, and he seemed studiously to avoid 
saying anything that could by any possibility be 
misconstrued. On the whole, the impression he made 
was unfavorable. Democrats derided him while Repub- 
licans were silent or apologized for him in a half-hearted 
way. 

In the evening of the day of his public reception by 
the General Assembly, the late Governor Dennison, 
to whose election, in 1859, ^^- Lincoln had contrib- 
uted by two memorable speeches, one at Cincinnati, 
and one at Columbus, gave a reception to Mr. Lincoln 
at his residence, which was largely attended. 

There he appeared to much better advantage 
and made an excellent impression. The travel stains 
were removed and a rest had evidently refreshed him. 
There was a singular charm in his manner, despite his 
ungainly person, which was a real attraction. His voice 
was peculiar, his speech quaint and homely, and his 
manner and bearing, though awkward according to the 

[22] 



tenets of fashion, was unaffected, easy and natural. 
The center of observation in a crowd of keen-eyed 
strangers, he was totally unembarrassed, and had a 
pleasant word for all. What he said, and the way he 
said it, conveyed an unexpected charm which was as 
pleasant as unexpected. He had the rare faculty of 
hiding his secret under a pleasant jest, and of illus- 
trating his arguments with an amusing'anecdote, and this 
faculty came into play on many occasions during his 
trip to Washington, when the public was as anxious to 
learn his policy as he was to conceal it. All that was 
unpleasant in the public reception was quite forgotten 
in his bearing at this social function, and all went away 
dehghted with his good humor, his jocular talk and 
the facility with which he caught the temper of every 
group with which he conversed. It is not too much to 
say that all were dehghted with the distinguished 
guest. 

Mr. Lincoln proceeded to Washington and received 
his oath of office from the venerable Chief Justice Taney 
whose decision in the Dred Scott case had done so 
much to intensify the anti-slavery sentiment of the 

[23] 



North, and to hasten the opening of the temple of Janus. 
It was the old civilization passing its torch to the new. 

From the moment of Lincoln's election the struggle 
which followed was inevitable, and the sooner it came 
the more easily it was to be met, and the more nobly 
concluded. True Hberty is always aggressive or per- 
secuted, but the attack is generally made on it by the 
power that is to be crushed. 

Fort Sumter was fired upon in April, 1861, and the 
country was aroused from its long dream of peace. 
Then, as in our recent war with Spain, it seemed to be 
with the nation as it sometimes is with the household 
on being suddenly aroused from a peaceful slumber: 
Some of the members are apt to be dazed and to do 
some very foolish things before they are wide awake. 
Sooner or later, however, all who have any wits manage 
to resume the use of them and the family and the nation 
move along once more on right Hues. 

At one of the most critical periods in our Civil War, 
when the hearts of the bravest stood still with dread 
of the issue, Mr. Lincoln reminded the Nation that "the 
dogmas of the quiet past are inadequate to the stormy 

[24] 



present. That the occasion is piled high with difficulty 
and we must rise with the occasion. As our cause is new, 
so we must think anew and act anew. We must dis- 
enthrall ourselves and then we shall save our country." 

The war came on and I entered the army the day 
of the firing on Sumter. After a service of two or three 
months with Rosecrans and McClellan in West Vir- 
ginia, I was promoted and ordered to the army of the 
Potomac, which I joined on the day of the first battle 
of Bull Run, July 21, 1861. 

Stationed in and near the city of Washington, while 
official duties never took me to the White House, I saw 
much of Mr. Lincoln during the next six months, for 
his was a familiar figure at receptions, on the streets of 
the city, in the grounds around the White House, in 
the hospitals, and in the neighboring camps. In all 
the hurly burly of a great war of which he was the cen- 
tral figure and guiding spirit he was yet the same gentle, 
genial, modest, patient, humble American citizen he 
had ever been. 

There was a noble dignity about the man, without 
any assumed superiority which so often marks the over- 

[25] 



elevation of a small soul. He rose, not above his place, 
but to it, and his deportment never brought discredit 
on the nation whose head he w^as. 

Early in his official life he became well known for 
his frequent little acts of helpful ministry to the poor 
and distressed, and these continued until the end. I 
was witness to several such, but let reference to one 
suffice. 

One day, with several other officers, I was in the 
office of the Paymaster General, Colonel Larned, when 
the President came in escorting an old lady, who from 
her garb and general appearance must have been very 
poor, and of the humblest class. 

^'Colonel," said he to the Paymaster General, "this 
is Mrs. Jones, who has retained me to look after a claim 
she has for the back pay of her soldier boy, and I have 
come over to see about it." 

"Well, Mr. President," said Colonel Larned, "be 
seated, and I will send a clerk to look the matter up, 
and relieve you from further trouble." 

"Oh, no, that won't do," said Mr. Lincoln pleasantly, 



[26] 



*'l must see to this myself, as she is my client for the 
time being." 

So the President was sent to another room with a 
clerk, the old lady going with them. 

We waited their return to see the outcome of the mat- 
ter. In a little while they returned, when on an in- 
quiry from Colonel Larned, Mr. Lincoln said: 

"Yes, Colonel, that is all right, and she will get her 
money tomorrow, but," dropping his voice and holding 
his hand to the side of his mouth, he continued jocosely, 
**How am I to get shut of the old lady?" 

"That, Mr. President, is not in the line of my duty, 
and I fear I cannot assist you," was the response. 

"Well, well," said the President, "then I'll have to 
manage it somehow." 

He then turned to the group of officers standing near, 
and, after greeting each one pleasantly, he said to the 
old lady; "Come along. Aunty, let's go over home," 
and he escorted her from the room, down the stairway 
and across to the White House with all the courtesy due 
to the most distinguished lady, chatting familiarly 
with her by the way. 

[27] 



He was one of the most approachable men I ever 
met in so high position. On one occasion, soon after 
I joined the Army of the Potomac, my friend, Major 
Fayette Brown, of Cleveland, and myself were passing 
through the grounds of the White House when we saw 
Mr. Lincoln standing in the north portico. Major 
Brown, by the way, was six feet three inches in height. 
He suggested that we go up and speak to the President, 
which we did, introducing one another. The Presi- 
dent's cordial greeting put us at our ease at once, and 
he talked freely and pleasantly, asking about some of 
the commands across the river. In the course of the 
conversation Major Brown said: "Mr. President, what 
is your height .?" 

"When I let myself out, this way," said he, straight- 
ening himself up, " I am six feet four inches. And how 
tall are you, Major ?" 

"I am six feet three inches, Mr. President, and I as- 
sure you it is a great pleasure to have seen one President 
that I can look up to." 

The prompt and witty response greatly amused Mr. 
Lincoln, who laughed heartily, and it was the cause of 

[28] 



securing us quite frequent recognition by him after- 
wards, and he often repeated the incident. 

Colonel E. D. Baker, who had been an officer in the 
Mexican War, and who was then a Senator in Congress 
from Oregon, though a citizen of California, and the 
commander of a regiment of volunteers in the Army of 
the Potomac, was one of Mr. Lincoln's most intimate 
friends of long standing, having been his associate at 
the bar and on the stump in Illinois for many years. 
He was a handsome man, of sturdy, vigorous frame and 
fine presence, an orator of note and one of the most 
genial and popular men of his day — the very Hampden 
of our Civil War. He is always intimately associated 
in my memory with Mr. Lincoln, not only because of 
their close friendship, and because I had often seen 
them together, but because I saw them together the 
last time they met in this life. It was on the lawn to the 
northeast of the White House one beautiful October 
afternoon in 1861. Mr. Lincoln sat on the ground 
leaning against a tree; Colonel Baker was lying prone 
on the ground his head supported by his clasped 
hands. The trees and the lawns were gorgeous in 

[29] 



purple and crimson and scarlet, like the curtains of 

God's tabernacle, fitting background for such a pic- \ 

ture. Near by was Mr. Lincoln's son Willie who died ( 

in the following February. The child was tossing the ' 

fallen leaves about in childish grace and abandon. I 
I was passing through the grounds with a friend, 

when, seeing the group, we paused, out of ear shot, ; 

of course, to study the picture which is vividly pho- ' 
tographed in my memory. Their conversation was 
low voiced, earnest and serious. No indication of 

merriment was visible, which was noticeable, because \ 
so different from ordinary conversations in which 

either of them took part. The pranks of the child , 

were in singular contrast with the subdued and serious i 

demeanor of the men. While we stood there. Colonel i 
Baker arose, took the President's hand and bade him 

adieu, lifted the child and kissed it, and went to his \ 

horse which was held by an orderly on the avenue : 

near by, mounted and rode away. The President's | 

gaze followed the retiring officer until he disappeared | 
to the West, when he took the child by the hand, 

and slowly and sadly returned to the house. j 

[303 ' 



You may naturally inquire what there was in so 
commonplace a tableau, even of such distinguished 
men to so fix it in the memory. It was the fact that 
on the following day Colonel Baker was killed at the 
unfortunate battle of Ball's Bluff, and I have always 
imagined that their conversation was of that battle 
and its possible issue. 

The death of Colonel Baker was a great shock to 
Mr. Lincoln, as it was, in fact, to the whole country, 
and one from which he was long in recovering, but 
the enormous bloodshed, suffering and disaster of 
the succeeding twelvemonth took away all sense of 
personal loss and private grief from one who constantly 
bore the nation's griefs and burdens. 

While I was in the Army of the Potomac in 1861, 
I was nominated and elected Secretary of State of 
Ohio, on the Union Ticket with Governor Tod. Our 
ticket that year received the unprecedented majority 
of 55,000. Mr. Lincoln's majority the previous year 
had been but 21,000. I had gone to the War Depart- 
ment late in the evening of election day to hear what 
news had been received of the Ohio election and to 

[31] 



give the news I had received. While I was there, 
Mr. Lincoln came in. He had heard the news from 
Ohio and was in great good humor. He seemed 
to keep his eye and thought on every battlefield, 
whether the weapons used were bullets or ballots, 
well knowing that the results of either contest was of 
vital moment to the great struggle which was in progress. 
I never saw him in such excellent spirits before, or 
after. This was the first important election that had 
been held since the war began, or since his own elec- 
tion, and he had looked to its results with great interest 
as indicating the temper of the people toward his 
administration. 

He had much to say of Ohio, her soldiers, her Gov- 
ernor (Dennison) and her steadfast loyalty. This was 
before Grant and Sherman and Sheridan and hundreds 
of others of our gallant men had won distinction. 

Two years later — October, '63 — ^when Lincoln re- 
ceived the word that John Brough had defeated Val- 
landigham by 100,000 majority, he sent his memorable 
dispatch: "Glory to God in the highest! Ohio has 
saved the nation." 

[32] 



While I was in charge of Ohio military affairs at 
Columbus, as Adjutant General of the State, from 
January, 1864, until the close of the war, I had, neces- 
sarily, more frequent intercourse with the President 
when visiting Washington, and better opportunity to 
observe what manner of man he was. 

By that time, however, people had come to know 
him better and to appreciate him more accurately. 
I had not seen him from the latter part of October, 
1 86 1, when I left the Army of the Potomac for the 
West, until June, 1864, when Ohio military affairs 
called me to Washington. What first struck me in 
Mr. Lincoln's appearance as differing from what 
it had been in 1861 was that he had aged perceptibly 
and far more than two and a half years would ordi- 
narily produce. The lines in his face, marked by 
fifty years of patient endurance, were deepened by 
the myriad of decisions he had been forced to make in 
the last three years. But, though he had for three 
years filled a throne great as that of any king or kaiser, 
with an ease, a grace and a dignity which became him 
as if born in the purple, yet his plain, homely manner 

[33] 



was unchanged by the social and intellectual attri- , 

tion of his high office. | 

My first call upon the President in 1864 was after I 
his second nomination and soon after an important I 
aid had been rendered the government in the volun- ; 
tary offer and prompt forwarding of a large contingent 1 
of Ohio troops in May, 1864, to which he referred i 
with considerable enthusiasm and kindly said that I I 
had contributed substantially to that work. Alto- 
gether his reception was most cordial and gratifying. ; 

But in my interview then and every time I saw ; 

him afterwards, I was saddened with the thought i 

that his load was almost too heavy for his strength, | 

and, stalwart and vigorous of frame though he was, ' 

that he was liable to sink under it at any moment, i 

Yet he was genial as ever, despite that undertone of I 

melancholy which never entirely forsook him. Trained I 

and disciplined in the school of privation, and de- 1 

veloped by a life of severest toil, a continuance of I 

sorrow and trial may have been necessary to bring \ 

out what was best in his nature. j 

He talked of the pending political campaign with 

[34] i 



great intelligence and interest, and had many per- 
tinent inquiries to make as to the political situation 
in Ohio. 

His anxiety as to the result of the election, however, 
seemed less on his own account than because of the 
effect his defeat might have on the issue of the war. 

There were some peculiar circumstances connected 
with the political campaign of that year not generally 
considered by historians of that time, and I allude 
to them here because I had served with McClellan in 
West Virginia and in the Army of the Potomac and with 
Fremont in the Shenandoah Valley and had very 
decided opinions as to the military qualifications of 
both. 

The fact that both McClellan and Fremont were 
candidates against Mr. Lincoln on platforms declaring 
the war a failure was well calculated to wound his 
sensibilities most keenly, though I never heard that 
he referred to either of the candidates in a bitter spirit. 

Fremont, who had been the Republican candidate 
in 1856 and for whose election Mr. Lincoln had ren- 
dered yeoman service, and for whose high rank in the 

[35] 



army he was indebted to Mr. Lincoln, had allowed 
himself to be made the candidate of a handful of 
Republican malcontents at the Cleveland Conven- 
tion. He had said many bitter things about Mr. 
Lincoln. In his letter of acceptance he said: 

"I consider that his (Lincoln's) administration has 
been politically, militarily and financially a failure, 
and that its necessary continuance is a cause of regret 
to the country." 

The animus of Fremont's attitude, however, was 
not hard to find. Mr. Lincoln was unwilling to take 
him, as a military man, at his own estimate, and that 
was a capital offense in Fremont's code. 

Talking of the Fremont movement one day to Gov- 
ernor Brough and myself, Mr. Lincoln told the story 
of two newly-arrived Irishmen who were puzzled 
over the noise of a tree frog and sought in vain to 
locate its source, when one of them finally said to the 
other: "Come off wid ye, Pat; sure, an' it's nothing 
but a noise." A good many things in this world at 
which timid people become greatly alarmed are found 
on nearer approach to be mere noise. 

[36] 



General McClellan, for whom Mr. Lincoln had 
risked much and estranged many friends, in retaining 
him at the head of the army long after the country had 
repudiated him, was the candidate of the Democratic 
party on a platform the chief plank in which was the 
declaration that the war had been a failure; to which 
alleged failure, by the way, the candidate had been 
chief contributor. Thus two men for whom he had 
done much and suffered much and who with every 
opportunity and unlimited resources had signally 
failed, were arrayed against him. 

To have been defeated at all would have been bad 
enough, but defeat by McClellan would have been 
in the nature of a personal injury. The Fremont 
party "petered out," as Mr. Lincoln expressed it, 
long before the election, the candidate being about the 
last member of the aggregation to disappear, but 
the opposition led by the repudiated commander kept 
up their attack to the last moment, when in the final 
assault the leader fell outside the breastworks, thus 
adding one more to his unbroken succession of defeats. 
Thus did the American people confirm in unmistak- 

[37] 



able terms the well-established principle that no man 
may take advantage of his own wrong. 

The campaign of that year was one of unexampled 
bitterness and Mr. Lincoln's exultation over his re- 
election was undisguised, but it was also unselfish. 
The man who could forgive a personal insult was 
great enough to put self aside and to regard the success 
as a victory of the Union forces and a declaration of 
the determination of the people to stand by free gov- 
ernment and the rights of humanity. 

When the secret history of that campaign, on which 
hung the life of this nation, comes to be written in 
all its details and ramifications, as I hope it never 
will be written, it will reveal a conspiracy of such 
widespread and alarming proportions and such depths 
of deceit, infamy and cruelty as will rouse the indig- 
nation of every true patriot; and Mr. Lincoln was 
the focal point of the whole damnable scheme, and 
his downfall and disgrace its sole object. 

But, thanks to that Providence which has never 
deserted any cause which makes for righteousness, 
Farragut at Mobile Bay, and Sherman at Atlanta 

[38] 



changed the entire aspect of things; conspiracy hid 
itself, frightened by the shouts of victory, and the 
Union was saved long before the final scene in the 
great tragedy at Appomattox. 

Mr. Lincoln had a rich fund of humor, and during 
his term of office he w^as best known to the world at 
large for his droll stories and humorous but forcible 
illustrations. But the underlying melancholy which 
had always attended him was intensified by the tragic 
events of the war, and was to me most pathetic, 

I had known Mr. Stanton, Secretary of War, from 
my early boyhood, and, when in Washington, was 
frequently in his office at the War Department, where 
my friend, the late General Anson Stager was chief 
telegrapher. I was there one evening during the awful 
battle summer of 1864, quite late and had been shown 
some dispatches from the front which were anything 
but pleasant. Near midnight we heard a heavy, 
measured step ascending the stairs and coming through 
the hall toward the open door of the office. 

"Stager," said Stanton in his quick, nervous way, 
"here comes the President; hide those dispatches 

[39] 



and cook up something not quite so gloomy, or he will 
not sleep tonight." 

Mr. Lincoln had come over from the White House 
entirely alone at that late hour to find comfort from 
his untiring war minister. Under the encouragement 
of a doctored telegram he became quite genial, and 
after a little pleasant conversation he returned home. 
"That," said Mr. Stanton, to me, when Mr. Lincoln 
retired, "is almost a nightly occurrence." 

The next time I saw Mr. Lincoln was in April, 1865, 
and he was in his coffin. 

The day of his assassination — Good Friday, day 
of evil omen — had been a gala day all over the country 
in honor of the fall of Richmond and the surrender 
of Lee. The day was an ideal one for such rejoicings. 
The display was very elaborate, and joy was uncon- 
fined. The war was over and the Union saved. Why 
should not the people rejoice .? At Columbus, where 
I was then stationed, the evening was briUiant with 
illumination and bonfires; jubilant crowds paraded 
the streets, and the city sank to sleep at a late hour, 
happy in the thought of the new era of peace which 

[40] 



had dawned. There was no premonition of the dark 
cloud which had even then settled down on our cause 
in the East, or of the night of horrors through which 
the people of Washington were passing. 

The next morning was gloomy and wet, but I was 
early at my office. The gay trappings of the day 
before hung limp and faded as if in mockery of yes- 
terday's rejoicings. I had been at my desk but a few 
moments when some one came in with the information 
that Lincoln, Seward, Stanton and Grant had been 
assassinated; that Lincoln was dead and the others 
would die. 

For the first time in the past four busy and eventful 
years I lost hope and broke down utterly. What 
did this forebode ? Was yesterday a dream ? Had 
chaos come again } 

I was recalled from my collapse somewhat rudely 
by the information that Rev. Col. Granville Moody 
was making an incendiary speech to an excited crowd 
at the corner of State and High Streets, and preaching 
bloody reprisals. I sent our private policeman, Capt. 
Bernard McCabe, to request him to stop, and the 

[41] 



Colonel sent an impertinent reply. I then directed 
his arrest and that he be brought to my office, which 
was done, and none too soon, for he was a celebrated 
hot gospeller and rabble rouser and had wrought the 
crowd to so high a pitch of excitement that they were 
about ready to use the torch and the rope. The most 
intense excitement everywiiere prevailed, and any 
sign of exultation at the cruel taking off of the nation's 
idol w^ould have met with summary punishment, so 
that I had enough to do to keep me from brooding 
over the terrible disaster. 

I allude to Mr. Lincoln's death in order to mention 
his funeral obsequies of which, by virtue of my office, 
I had general charge from the Pennsylvania line to the 
Indiana line; that is, while the remains of the President 
were in the state of Ohio. Elaborate preparations 
were made at Cleveland and Columbus for the recep- 
tion of the funeral escort, and to enable the people 
to view the remains. At Cleveland the body lay in 
state on a catafalque erected for the purpose in the 
public square near where the Perry monument then 



[42] 



stood. At Columbus they were exposed upon the 
catafalque in the rotunda of the Capitol. 

Our party left Cleveland for the East in the early 
morning and met the funeral train at the Eastern 
State line about sunrise. The train was black robed 
throughout, and the funeral car contained the remains 
of Mr. Lincoln and those of his son Willie who died 
two years before. The train was drawn by the engine 
"Union," the same which had drawn the train which 
carried Mr. Lincoln to Washington four years before. 
As we sped along westward in the early spring morning 
tearful groups of men, women and children were 
gathered by the roadside, some clad in mourning, 
some holding flags draped in black. Flags were at 
half mast in all the villages and in farmyards, and the 
people were massed at the stations. At Cleveland 
and Columbus immense crowds thronged the streets 
and passed to view the remains. At Columbus, the 
State House was elaborately draped and along the 
west facade were displayed those memorable words 
from Lincoln's Second Inaugural Address which had 



[43] 



been the keynote of his whole official life: "With 
malice toward none, with charity for all." 

The beautiful rotunda of the State House was trans- 
formed into a gorgeous tomb, but we had studiously 
avoided any effort at mere display. Everything was 
simple and beautiful in arrangement as became the 
character of him for whom it was a memorial. 

Never in our previous history had such crowds 
assembled, yet there was a solemn hush over all in- 
dicative of the strong hold this plain westerling had 
upon the hearts of the people. Each one had lost a 
friend and all spoke with a sense of personal grief. 
Not less than fifty thousand persons viewed the re- 
mains at Columbus, and probably as many more did 
so at Cleveland. 

The closing scene at Columbus was of such impress- 
ive solemnity that I hesitate to attempt a description. 

The westerly sun seemed to shed a peculiar glory 
and bathed the city in golden radiance. The mourn- 
ing crowds had departed and none remained in or 
about the Capitol save the few who had there a duty 
to perform. A group of ladies, chosen for that purpose, 

[44] 



entered the rotunda and sat for a short time beside 
the catafalque in tearful silence. The guard of honor, 
which never left the remains, kept up their faithful 
vigil, vi^alking with solemn tread about the platform. 
A halo of the golden sunlight filtered through the 
summit of the dome, and hung above the silent group 
beneath like a benediction. The evening shadows 
were gathering in the corridors and creeping stealth- 
ily up the stairways, when in an oppressive silence, 
Governor Brough and myself with a few others entered 
the rotunda through the eastern arch, and, with the 
guard of honor and the attending ladies, followed the 
remains from the Capitol to the grounds without. As 
the silent procession emerged through the western 
door of the State House a band played "Old Hundred," 
a national salute was fired, the remains were conveyed 
to the funeral car, and, as the sun sank from sight 
in the west the train passed from the city. 

The route from Columbus to Richmond, Indiana, 
was traversed in the night, but that did not prevent 
the tributes of honor. Bonfires and torch-lights were 
continuous, and symbols of mourning were every- 

[45] 



where displayed. At Urbana three thousand persons 
were at the station. The train was stopped for a few 
minutes and ten young ladies entered the car and 
strewed flowers on the martyr's coffin. One of the 
ladies was so affected that she wept aloud in great 
anguish. 

On the outside a platform had been erected on which 
was a choir of forty voices, men and women, repre- 
senting all the city churches, who sang with touching 
melody, "Go to thy rest." 

At Piqua, which was reached at midnight, ten 
thousand were assembled. Here lamps, torches and 
bonfires lit up the night. The depot was elaborately 
illuminated, bands from Troy and Piqua played appro- 
priate music, and a large choir from the churches of 
the city led by Rev. Granville Moody, sang a funeral 
hymn, which was followed by a choir of thirty-six 
ladies in white costumes and black sashes, who sang 
a plaintive melody which touched the hearts of all 
who heard it. 

At Richmond, Indiana, which was reached at three 
o'clock on Sunday, not less than ten thousand people 

[46] 



assembled. There our party left the train, and it 
sped on its way to Indianapolis and Chicago, and 
to his final restingplace in the home he loved so 
well. 

The mortal part of Abraham Lincoln rests in an 
honored tomb which will be long remembered, but the 
memory of his high statesmanship, wise above com- 
parison and as openly faithful as any in this age has 
witnessed, will live in Anglo-Saxon hearts, not only 
as the best example of what our race can attain, but 
as an encouragement to the lowest and most obscure 
that the highest and the best is attainable. 

No American since Washington is so enshrined 
in the hearts of the people as is Mr. Lincoln. And 
it grows out of no mere sentimental or official respect. 
They know in whom they believed, and their affec- 
tion is genuine and will be lasting. 

Yet, great as is that affection he merited it all by 
his manly character, his masterful conduct of affairs, 
the tenor of his life, which was pure and noble, his 
integrity which was thorough and incorruptible. His 
mind and heart were broad and generous 'as the vast 

[47] 



prairies of his Western home, true and sturdy as its 
oaks and gentle as its flowers. 

Environed in his high office by cant and affecta- 
tion, he was simple, unaffected, true. 

Thwarted and embarrassed by blunderers he sel- 
dom made a mistake. 

He was firm in character, comprehensive in act, 
and wise in a policy so rarely tempered that it could 
at once conciliate and command. 

One of the mildest and most peace-loving of men, 
yet it was his to be the leader of the most extensive 
and desolating civil war in history. 

It is interesting in this connection to notice that 
one of the leading delegates in the Parliament of 
Peace at the Hague, stated before that Parliament 
that it was the action of Mr. Lincoln in drawing up a 
code of rules of war for the Union^armies which prompt- 
ed Alexander H, the then Czar of Russia to propose 
the Brussels conference at the Hague, of which the 
recent conference was but the sequel. So that Mr. 
Lincoln's action was the initial effort to make war, 
which Napoleon called the science of barbarians, 

[48] 



more humane, and to elevate it above a mere death 
struggle of wild beasts. 

In all the many and diverse qualities that go to 
make up character, Lincoln was a thoroughly genuine 
man. His sense of justice was perfect, ever present 
and all controlling. His integrity was second to none; 
his ambition was stainless, and from his mental cru- 
cible came no dross or slag, but only the pure gold 
of principle. 

In the midst of doubt he was clear. 

Sincere and straightforward, he was never ill-timed 
or blunt. 

He never sought to create public sentiment; he 
embodied it, for he walked hand in hand with the 
common people who loved him and trusted him as 
he did them, for he was one of them. 

He was a statesman in that he was able to discover 
the trend of events and to shape the course of national 
affairs in harmony therewith. He knew his country 
and his time, for he held his finger on the Nation's 
pulse and he both heard and saw. 

Such men as Mr. Lincoln represent the conscience 

[49] 



of a people, inchoate it may be for a time, but when 
that conscience is developed and perfected, in pro- 
portion as they are held in honor is a people fully 
cognizant of their representative character and all 
that it implies. 

He destroyed human slavery under the stars and 
stripes, an object for which men who seemed far better 
equipped — so different are God's ways from ours — 
had long sought in vain. 

That historical state paper which spoke freedom 
to a race closed with these impressive words which 
sound like the deliverance of an inspired prophet of 
the old Theocracy: 

"Upon this act, sincerely believed to be an act of 
justice, warranted by the Constitution, upon mili- 
tary necessity, I invoke the considerate judgment 
of mankind and the gracious favor of Almighty God." 

The "gracious favor of Almighty God" came 
promptly, because, on January i, 1863, when that 
proclamation was made, though the road was yet long 
and bloody and thickly strewn with dead men, yet 
Appomattox lay at the end and was even then in sight. 

[50] 



Slavery was vital to the Southern cause, and Mr. 
Lincoln struck the Confederacy in its most vital part. 
He formulated the great principle of Emancipation 
as a political doctrine, and wrought it into our national 
fabric, where it will endure while the nation lives. 

That emancipation was not a mere sentiment, but 
that he had the fact very near his heart is evidenced 
by his Fourth Annual Message, in December, 1864, 
in which he used this significant language: "I repeat 
the declaration made a year ago, that 'while I remain 
in my present position I shall not attempt to retract 
or modify the emancipation proclamation, nor shall I 
return to slavery any person who is free by the terms 
of that proclamation, or by any of the acts of Congress.' 
"If the people should, by whatever mode or means, 
make it an executive duty to re-enslave such persons 
another and not I must be their instrument to enforce 
it." 

I have no doubt he had Emancipation in his mind 
and purpose the moment Sumter was fired upon, but 
no man knew so well as he did how to bide his time. 
He never spoke or acted too early or too late. He 

[51] 



was constantly importuned by enthusiasts to declare 
emancipation and was denounced because he would not. 
He was unmoved by clamor, adverse criticism or abuse, 
even though it threatened the rupture of valued friend- 
ships, and the loss of powerful influences on which 
he had come to rely in support of his policies. 

To have proclaimed freedom to the slave at the 
beginning would have been fatal to our cause. To have 
proclaimed it after the battle of Bull Run, even, would 
have been disastrous. 

It would no doubt have drawn away from us the 
border states of Maryland, Kentucky and Missouri 
where the secession element really predominated. 
Furthermore, that large element at the North which 
opposed emancipation, some on principle and some be- 
cause they thought the time had not yet come, would 
in all probability have refused its support of the 
Union cause at a time when we were barely holding 
our own. 

But above all was the fact, ever present in Mr. 
Lincoln's mind, as his speeches and papers abund- 
antly attest, notably his letter to Mr. Greeley, that 

[52] 



the war was being waged primarily to restore the 
Union and to settle the right of secession. If slavery 
were made the primary issue, as it would have been 
by a too early proclamation of emancipation, no mat- 
ter what the result of the war, the question of secession 
would have been unsettled, and might come up at some 
future time to give us trouble. By holding to his 
original purpose and making all other questions, no 
matter how vital, secondary, the contest once settled 
the question of the right of secession would be settled 
for all times. 

The pressure which was brought to bear upon him 
to force him to declare freedom to the slaves in ad- 
vance of his own judgment as to the proper time was 
tremendous, and would have compelled almost any one 
else to yield. This pressure all came from white men, 
politicians and others. Those who were most vitally 
interested — the negroes in slavery — ^were the least 
impatient. Their confidence in Mr. Lincoln was 
sublime in its degree, touching in its simplicity. One 
of them expressed the general feeling thus: 

"Pretty soon we shall be free. We don't know 

[53] 



just when, but the good Lord and Massa Lincoln 
know, and they will tell us in their own good time." 

When asked if they were not impatient at the delay, 
an old saint in ebony, on a Virginia plantation, said 
to me, "Oh, no; of course Massa Lincoln knows best." 

But Mr. Lincoln was led by circumstances and not 
by impulse. His unerring judgment selected the proper 
time to speak, and he erected that moral breastwork 
without which he dare not hope for "the gracious 
favor of Almighty God," but behind which our cause 
was safe, and to the dumb, dark millions who had 
waited so long, so patiently and so uncomplainingly, 
the hour came at last when the glad evangel of Freedom 
broke the long, sad silence of their night of wrong, and 
made victory possible. 

Mr. Lincoln was a good man, a God-fearing man; 
honest, temperate, forgiving, long-suffering, self-sacri- 
ficing. 

I care Httle what may have been his creed, for I 
know what his character was, and that is a far better 
standard than any mere formula of words can be. 
He believed in the Fatherhood of God and the Brother- 

[54] 



hood of man. His sermons were deeds of helpful 
ministry and his life exemplified his faith. 

If it be true, as I believe it is, that character and 
service and a true sense of the law of stewardship 
are the only convincing evidences of the possession of 
a religious spirit, then was Mr. Lincoln a religious 
man in the true sense. 

He never spoke unkindly of any one, not even 
of traitors in arms, or of assassins plotting against 
his life. To one who said to him, a few 'days before 
his death, speaking of Jefferson Davis: "Do not allow 
him to escape the laws; he must be hanged," Mr. 
Lincoln replied calmly, "Judge not, that ye be not 
judged." 

He possessed in an unusual degree that rare nobility 
of soul that places a man above all petty, personal 
feeling, and which belongs not to rank and title but 
to integrity and worth. 

It is scarcely possible to exaggerate his worth, 
his sagacity, his remarkable genius. His state papers 
abound in language of classic beauty and are instinct 
with rare common sense, with shrewd but profound 



wisdom and lofty thought. They were great because 
the writer's great soul was in every utterance, and 
his soul was a temple to which great thoughts came 
to worship and his speech was a magic wand which 
swayed the hearts of men as the tempest sways the 
trees of the forest. 

He was a man without vices of habit or speech. 
Few men in the annals of the race have been as thorough- 
ly tested; tested by opposition, by slander, by ridicule; 
yet he bore no malice, remembered no abuse, showed 
no vindictiveness. 

His last official act was in the afternoon of that 
fateful Friday when, learning that two of the promi- 
nent leaders of the RebelHon were to arrive in disguise 
at one of the principal ports hoping to escape to Europe, 
he instructed his officers not to arrest them, but to 
let them escape from the country. He did not thirst 
for their blood, though in a few hours, one of their 
associates took his life in the most cruel and dastardly 
manner. 

At the very moment when his mind was busy matur- 
ing plans of reconstruction and his heart was yearning 

[56] 



for reconciliation and anxious to forgive, the treacher- 
ous blow fell. It only lacked the deep damnation 
of his taking-off to fill the cup of the iniquity of slavery 
to the full and to make that accursed institution the 
horror of our history. 

In raising a flag above Independence Hall in Phila- 
delphia in February, 1861, he said: 

"It was something in the Declaration of Inde- 
pendence giving liberty, not only to the people of this 
country, but hope to the world for all coming time. 
It is that which gives promise that in due time the 
weights should be lifted from the shoulders of all men 
and that all should have an equal chance. 

"Now, my friends, can this country be saved upon 
that basis ^ If it can, I will consider myself one of 
the happiest men in the world if I can help to save it. 
But if this country can not be saved without giving up 
that principle, I was about to say that I would rather 
be assassinated upon the spot than to surrender it. I 
have said nothing but what I am willing to live by 
and if it be the pleasure of Almighty God, to die by." 

[57] 



To a delegation urging emancipation, he said: 
"When the time comes for dealing with slavery I 
trust I shall be willing to do my duty though it 
costs me my life. And, gentlemen, lives will be 
lost." 

Did he then have the dark shadow of his cruel 
death hovering in his mind ? If he had, he shrank 
not from the sacrifice but marched with calm and steady 
pace to meet it. The drama of history presents no 
scene more impressive in its tragedy than that which 
was enacted at Ford's Theater, Washington, on the 
night of April 15, 1865. 

Although he fell a victim of the bullet of an assassin 
by as foul a murder as ever disfigured the annals 
of our civilization, I doubt if, in his entire career, 
checkered as it w^as and passed among a primitive 
people, and in the rude life of the frontier, he ever 
made a personal enemy. 

He was stricken, not for anything in his own per- 
sonality, but because he was the exponent of the great 
principle of national and personal freedom and the 
beloved representative of a loyal people. 

[58] 



Truly did he live "with malice toward none, with 
charity for all." 

His life illustrates the important fact, too often lost 
sight of, that the reputation which endures is built 
by the man himself and not by censorious critics. But 
he lived long enough to receive the consolation of 
success though it came so late as to prove but a setting 
glory. Since his death, however, his former unfriendly 
critics have become his eulogists, his libellers have 
become his admirers and his enemies his worshippers. 
The world's verdict if slow is very apt to be just. 
Careless of monument over his grave, he builded it 
in the world; a monument by which we are taught 
to remember, not where he died, but where he lived. 

History never embalmed a reputation more spot- 
less, or more sacred, and it has already done justice 
to his name while it is yet fresh in living memories. 
As his homely figure recedes and rises into history, 
we shall see yet more clearly the grandeur and dignity 
of its proportions, and it is not too much to say that 
future generations will recognize in him the central 
figure of the nineteenth century in American history. 

[59] 



Looking at the character and the career of this man 
from the standpoint of this later day, when a genera- 
tion has passed since his death and almost a century- 
has passed since his birth, when time has clarified 
the vision and ripened the judgment, we are able to 
realize that no man in our history has gone so far as 
he in securing and holding the kind of fame com- 
pounded of admiration for commanding ability and 
service and love, for tenderness of heart, sweetness 
of nature and beauty of spirit. 

Considering his circumstances and appearance, there 
is nothing more extraordinary than the growing ap- 
preciation of certain rare beauty in his character 
which, now that the misconception and passion of his 
day have passed, throw about his uncouth figure a 
soft radiance. 

There was something in his unique personality 
which evoked a tenderness which has gone out to no 
other President. We not only revere the memory — ■ 
we love the man. 

His largeness of vision; so much broader than 
those with whom he worked, becomes more apparent 

[60] 



in the light of greater events, and can only be accounted 
for in his greatness of soul. The intervening years 
have distilled, as it were, from his great reputation, 
a finer, purer, higher fame. 

We are jarred, sometimes disgusted, at the mean- 
ness to which public men stoop in the strife and jealousy 
of political life, which can only waste and baffle the 
strength and plans of real statesmanship. The mag- 
nanimity, patience, unselfishness and sanity of this 
man set him apart from the moral egotists, the harsh 
radicals and the complaisant politicians of his time. 

I think the estimate of the country today may be 
briefly stated as being of a great, tender, human soul, 
by temperament and conditions, solitary perhaps, 
bearing a burden of sorrows, not his own, but of a 
whole people; called to rule a household, widely divided, 
though still a household, without hatred or any spirit 
of strife, but with a heart of compassion for those who 
opposed, as for those who would sustain. 

As the years go by and the Blue and the Gray are 
equally honored, the prescience of this man grows 
more distinct. Like Moses, he died without the sight 

[6i] 



of the promised land, yet we now know that he was the 
inspired prophet of a future, now a living present. 

There were men of great ability about Lincoln in 
his trying hours — men of great patriotism as the 
world then looked upon such things, and their services 
can not be overlooked — but he stands out separate and 
apart from all by reason of a certain largeness they 
lacked, which we did not perceive at the time. 

Now that the old feelings, animosities and passions 
are dead, those who opposed him, as well as those who 
sustained him, have joined in the acclaim, and hail him 
as the "First American." 

^ SjS v|» <« ^ 



[62] 



The final result of the deadly assault on the life 
of the Nation in 1861, so horrible in appearance at 
the outset, was a confirmation of our greatness; a 
trial of our strength; a punishment of our sham pre- 
tenses, and the establishment in our hands forever of 
the leadership in the political progress and freedom 
of the world. 

Now, with a united country we join in a holy com- 
pact to stand as the exemplar and champion of justice 
and mercy the world around. And the crimson of the 
blood that has sealed this covenant imparts a richer 
hue to our banner of beauty and glory which has risen 
as a new aurora in the distant islands of the sea, a 
very evangel of liberty. 

Who dare say, in the light of today, that a single 
soldier of that mighty host, from commander-in-chief 
to drummer boy, died in vain .? 



[the end] 



[63] 



FEB L.J. 1909 



LIBRARY OF CONGRESS 

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